


It's Hard to Say

by 100dabbo



Category: The Thick of It (TV)
Genre: Angst, Break Up, Implied/Referenced Sex, M/M, Reconciliation, S03e08, Unresolved Emotional Tension, s03e07
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 02:15:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29428677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/100dabbo/pseuds/100dabbo
Summary: Hours after Malcolm's resignation, Ollie calls him at home.
Relationships: Ollie Reeder/Malcolm Tucker
Comments: 4
Kudos: 10





	It's Hard to Say

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ttoibrainrot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ttoibrainrot/gifts).



> For Mo ♥ This is adapted from the ramble I did the other day, I hope you like it even more now 💖  
> Title is a line from Elliott Smith's 'Oh Well, OK' ✨

As soon as Malcolm saw the press pack, he knew it was going to be difficult. When he first caught sight of the clamouring swarm They were hounding around the front of his house, crowding right beside the hedge so as not to trespass any further than the garden path. The keen lenses of each and every camera were already pointing at the empty house, taking snapshots of the now former spin doctor’s windows, as if that’d be useful to any paper.

He knew it’d only be a few more metres of walking until they were directed at him with their bright flashes and obnoxious questions, before he’d have to bite his tongue to prevent the unseemly, yet completely deserved, expletives from coming out. Still, as he shoved past, denying each and every one of them an answer on how he was feeling, what has next plans were and when the potential return may be, one or two gestures were thrown their way to serve as his only response. 

Once he slipped into the hallway, door crashing behind him with the force of his anger, the silence that the house held could finally seep in. Of course, the low murmur of the press remained twenty feet on the other side of that door, but the entrance, the place he stood without moving a muscle, was void of noise all together. The slight creak of the floorboards under his feet while he shifted his weight, and the quick, jittery breaths was all the sound he could make. Everything was still but his beating heart and the dust flurrying through the air. In his paralysis, the last words he spoke, “you will see me again” didn’t stop ringing in his ears.

Until there was a different kind of ring.

This one jolted him, its sound emitting from his inside jacket pocket. It was his phone, and he realised that instantly; not the Blackberry confiscated by Fleming just one hour prior, of course, but his personal piece, the one Ollie had gotten him for his birthday to defy the strict ‘no gifts’ rule Malcolm had imposed on just about anyone who would bother to remember the occasion at all. 

He was always one to go against the grain, Ollie. Always one to bend the rules in an effort to make Malcolm happy. When he opened it, the fucker even said he’d have the opportunity to cheat; that or start selling drugs. Malcolm was too shocked to quip back at him for the first time ever.

So, at the sound, Malcolm moved to take it out, dipping his hand into the pocket to seize it and stare back at the caller on the display, not surprised to see Ollie’s name and face staring back at him. He picked up, beginning to kick off his shoes as their lines were connected, letting Ollie be the first to speak,

“Malc? Malc, are you alright? I’ve been calling and calling but the reception in this fucking building—”

“Yeah, tell me about it.”

Malcolm didn’t expect his voice to break when he said it. He regretted opening his mouth the moment the words came out, walking through to the living room just to slump on the sofa. He sounded vulnerable, weak, and emotional – three things he couldn’t bear for Ollie to see. He cleared his throat, a rough cough just to clear the airway and disguise it, but it was too late, he’d sensed the heartbreak in him already.

“I’m coming round. Now.” He said, the slight shuffling on his side audible, like he was grabbing for his coat or bag, or both, “I hate to say it, but there’s actually a collective celebrating your dismissal right now, and, uh, while that’s shitty, obviously, it doesn’t look like I’ll be noticed it I slip out,” He paused to let Malcolm reply, but nothing came, so in his usual drawl of awkward air filling, carried on with his point, “So, I’ll- I’ll be there in fifteen, alright? There’s no press round the back door I’m guessing?”

The back door. The back fucking door. Why the fuck didn’t he walk that way round? He’d made the taxi drop him off a street away just to avoid any reporters that were on his tail, so why the fuck not take the other way in too? He blamed it on his daze, the temporary stupor of shock and anger that had yet to simmer down in his boiling blood. Only Ollie’s voice could make him calm and rational now.

“They’re hounding me like a pack of rabid fucking dogs, Ollie,” He explained, chewing his lip and offering a glance out the gap in the curtains where they all still stood in expectancy of another statement, “I don’t want you anywhere near me—” He shook his head, trying to backtrack as quick as possible, “The house, I mean!” Silence followed when further consolation ought to have done. “Listen, Ollie, you can stay on the phone, _please_ stay on the phone, but it’s safer for the both of us if you’re out of the spotlight, yeah? It’s already burning on me like fuckin’ gonorrhoea over here and it’s not leaving anytime soon.”

“Yeah. Alright, Malcolm.”

He sounded cold and jaded. Malcolm didn’t do himself any favours with that one. Ollie still continued, “I’ll keep out of your way, don’t want anyone thinking I’m associated with you in _any way_ after all.” He didn’t need to say it so bitterly, but then again, maybe he did. 

Three beeps followed his words to signify the end of the call, and as Malcolm took it away from his ear, he had to watch his own face twist into a grimace in the black reflection, the anger on his own behalf, and from Steve fucking Fleming, because the only person he wanted to be with, the only person that cared enough to be with him in the first place, he’d just pushed away.

“Fuck’s sake.” Was all he could hiss in his own solitude, tossing the phone to the other side of the sofa and covering his face with his hands.

It wasn’t until a week later that they were reunited at the DoSAC offices - unplanned, by a complete coincidence. Or perhaps it was luck. Seeing him in his casual clothes, Ollie had to double take when he saw him in the corridor on his way out.

“I won’t do any blowjob jokes if you don’t mate.” He said to him ten minutes later in the office, laughing to lighten to mood, to break the ice, to relieve just some of the tension that’d been silently stewing over their unofficial break. He said it with his chest too, nothing subtle or quiet about it, despite knowing that it was only two Tuesdays ago that Ollie was visiting his Number 10 office for the evening, just to be on his knees for half an hour of it.

Ollie had to grit his teeth and smile awkwardly, Malcolm forcing himself to say his apology and not let the air run dry again, “I’m sorry, Ollie, I really am, just—”

“You just needed to be away from me and everyone else at all costs, yeah?”

No.

“Yeah…”

The lie was only to save himself the explanations and intricacies of the real reason, the real fact that allowing such a vulnerable state to be seen by Ollie was more threatening than the actual peril of his career crashing down at his feet.

“Mhm.” Ollie could only hum at him on his way out of the office, fist clenched up in his pocket. He was sure this wasn’t going to be the end of them, but he still felt as pushed away and unwanted as ever, even if Malcolm’s weak smiles and sad eyes told him the apology was genuine.

“So, are you not gonna ask me how I’m gettin’ on?”

“Well, Malcolm,” He turned, the tails of his scarf swishing by the sides of his coat, “I would’ve asked you that a week ago,” There was really no need to make him suffer a guilt heavier than he already felt, “Still. How are you?”

“I want you to come to mine. Tonight. I’ll cook dinner, kiss and make up and all that.” Ollie barely responded to him save for a twitch of the eyebrow. “Come on! What d’you want me to say?”

“Preferably to admit you’re a massive twat who can’t handle his feelings and has to shove away everyone that’s ever cared about you just so you—”

“You _know_ that’s not true.” His voice murmured it, but the accent of severity he’d so often poise when roused to his own defence maintained itself, forcing Ollie to step back as the other man approached, softening his look. “You know for a fact I just wanted you out of the public eye. Out of the stupid fucking limelight.”

Pushing up his glasses, affirming his seriousness, Ollie had to clench his jaw once more before replying.

“Fine. What time?”

The agreement to the suggestion made Malcolm’s mouth twitch into a smile for just a half second, just a moment of genuine and overt happiness before it straightened out again, eyes darting to the corridor in suspicion of possible onlookers.

“Swing by Number Ten like usual, say six, right?” Ollie nodded at him, looking in his eyes, their glaze somewhat apologetic. “We’ll share a taxi.”

Nothing else was said, and Ollie only slipped out of the liaison office, making his way back into the department to, presumably, report back to Nicola of his arrival. 

At exactly six o’clock, Ollie arrived at Number 10, knocking on Malcolm’s door with a single rap of his knuckles before he let himself in, eyes scanning about the emptied office with confusion, barely even registering Malcolm sitting in the chair on the other side of the desk. Malcolm jumped to explain before the other man’s questions even had a chance to surface,

“They took it all last week, the cheeky fuckers. Bringing it back tomorrow of course.” His feet propped themselves up on the bare desk as he spoke, trying to catch Ollie’s elusive eyes. 

They were stick tracking, almost looking bemused at the blank and baren room, so much lacking in quintessential Malcolm-ness (despite the very man sitting in the room) making it seem all the more odd. No books lined the mantle, no piles of paper occupied the mahogany desk, no paintings stuck on the wall, professional or otherwise. When turned to look at the wall that had accommodated his niece’s, Malcolm once more felt compelled to speak, “I told them that if a finger was laid on those paintings, someone would be losing that finger.”

“It’d be like tearing up a fucking Picasso if they dared doing that.” Came the hesitant reply, warranting a little chuckle out of Malcolm before each foot landed off the desk and he stood, making his way towards Ollie slower than he had earlier that day, his lethargy a sign of his emotional exhaustion if nothing else.

In an approach like this, it wouldn’t be uncommon for him to grab so something; his tie, his scarf, his jacket or even his belt just to pull him forward, but this time, Malcolm only extended his arms, wrapping them around Ollie’s taller frame, burying his nose in his neck to feel what he’d been missing for a week: the touch and the smell and the warmth of Ollie beside him.

With his voice deep and muffled by the collar of Ollie’s coat, the three syllables he spoke were barely intelligible, and yet when his arms squeezed tighter, it was obvious what was said.

“I’m sorry.”

Ollie returned the embrace softly, unable to deny that he too had missed him terribly, that his own stubbornness and saltiness towards Malcolm’s attitude was too much, that when his heart leaped to see him at DoSAC, it was clear that he wanted resolution just as much as he did.

So, in the empty office, its only furniture the adjacent desk and its accompanying, single chair, they reconciled in a moment, beating hearts against beating hearts, skin against skin, and all their sorrow dissolved to be reunited. Ollie replied with three syllables of his own,

“I love you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading :) Check me out on [Tumblr](https://100dabbo.tumblr.com/)!


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